London! We Could Go There One Day!

Right. If you have a 'real' job in an exciting city - London, say - and you have a sibling who spends their life doing 'fun' things like prancing around dressed as a bookshelf or teaching young people about phallic imagery then I entreat you to run a 'Bring Your Sibling to Work Week' as my sister has done. Check out how awesome the real world is:

On Day 1, between Royal Mail coffee cups, dearest sister suggested I use my lunch break to explore the local surroundings. Oh. Okay. Sure. 

WOW. 

On Day 2, amongst the phone calls and operating the oldest working lift in London, sister suggested I move to the rooftop fire escape to get a better view of the soldiers in the courtyard outside who had been entertaining us all day with their drums and marching and shuffling and chinooks. 

Second from the left in the front row is looking the wrong way. Naughty. 

The roof was also good for pretending that I was Dick van Dyke in 'Mary Poppins'. 

 And for conquering my fear of heights. 

AMAZING!

On Day 3, before we even thought of running out for milk or replenishing the coffee cups, sister suggested a rave. At 6:30am. With the lights on. And no alcohol. 

It was IMMENSE. And also very sweaty. 

Strangely, despite the fact that I have genetically 80s hair and uncannily orangutan-like dance moves, I have never been to a rave and thus was very worried about not having an appropriate rave outfit but luckily, I was staying the night with my friend Chandni who, upon hearing the word 'morning rave', nodded sagely and started rummaging around in her wardrobe, pulling out items that became this most rave-worthy outfit:

YES. Never have I felt more appropriately dressed. Think early morning rave, think leggings and sparkly crop tops.

On Day 4, the weather perked up again and since I was tired after all the raving, I spent my lunch time in the absolutely gorgeous St Dunstan in the East park, which looks like something out of a post-apocalyptic film where nature has taken over civilisation, which in some ways is true because the church was bombed in WW2 but instead of rebuilding, the Parks and Gardens people created this space in 1964. 

 

It is very peaceful here so if you work in the city, I highly recommend it for a relaxing lunch time experience. 

On day 5, it was obviously Halloween and the UK seems to be taking this far more seriously than I ever remember it, which is saying something considering I lived a year of my life with an American from Salem, MA, where they take Halloween very seriously. It turns out that in the world of real people with real jobs, craft skills are as necessary as they are in teaching, and I watched on in admiration as my sister carved this wonderfully frightening creature to sit below my Halloween lilies:

The slightly sad thing in the bottom right hand corner is my attempt at a paper bag pumpkin. Just in case you were wondering. 

As if this wasn't enough Halloween excitement, we were also joined in the afternoon by an argument of wizards who collected in the Guildhall to receive their O.W.L.s (I'm so sorry for the HP reference. It hurt me to do it but it makes the blog reader-friendly). 

So. Take your sibling to work week. Awesome fun times.